The conventional safety razor makes use of a blade support structure that rigidly holds the blade that is pressed against the skin for shaving so that the skin is forced to be stretched into a substantially straight line for contact with the blade as the hair is being severed from the skin. These known structures must be pressed rather firmly against the face to engage the line of skin contact so that the razor's shaving edge can be pressed into depressed areas and conversely must be pressed lightly against the skin to avoid cutting it as the razor passes over protrusions that flow under the shaving edge when the razor is pulled over the surface being shaved. When deeper sharply defined dimples are present and when the shaving edge encounters surface conditions such as, for example, sharp jaw or shin bone areas which must be shaved, if the conventional razor is not precisely guided around such jaw bone or dimpled areas, etc., it is easily possible to cut through the outer layers of the skin and sometimes deep cuts are inflicted on the shaver.
Typical examples of known prior art razors that propose to show some form of flexibility in an attempt to ameliorate these difficult problems are shown in the following U.S. Patents:
______________________________________ U.S. Pat. No. 1383783 - to Billingsley July 1921 U.S. Pat. No. 1932110 - to Koree October 1933 U.S. Pat. No. 2521481 - to Rodriques September 1950 U.S. Pat. No. 3262206 - to Tomek July 1966 U.S. Pat. No. 3500539 - to Muros March 1970 U.S. Pat. No. 3583262 - to Mullen February 1971 U.S. Pat. No. 3587171 - to Perry June 1971 U.S. Pat. No. 3777396 - to Simonetti December 1973 U.S. Pat. No. 3823471 - to Stone July 1974 U.S. Pat. No. 3832774 - to Perry September 1974 U.S. Pat. No. 4069580 - to Cartwright et al October 1983 U.S. Pat. No. 4409735 - to Cartwright et al October 1983 ______________________________________
The Stone patent is typical of several that suggest an improved shave can be realized by providing a flexible handle means for supporting a more or less rigid conventional shaving head.
Muros illustrates a system for using a bendable guard bar in front of a substantially rigid blade means to alter the shaving edges exposure to the skin being shaved. This approach continuously alters the relative shaving angle of tangency of the blade to the face and the degree of edge exposure relative to the guard means as the razor is moved over the protruding and receding areas of the skin being shaved.
Billingsley provides a bendable support for a plurality of blades that are arranged in a parallel relationship and are caused to take a relatively more of less fanned out or different radiating angled position one with respect to the other, as the support for the shaving blades is flexed about its single axis of flexibility, which axis is parallel to the otherwise rigid blades themselves.
Koree is of interest only for the showing of a blade with an open center portion to permit the blade to flex in two planes when it is permanently clamped between the head 2 and guard 3 as the treaded shank of the head is engaged by the handle.
Muros discloses a flexible guard means disposed in front of a blade that is fixed in a shaving position. The location of the guard relative to the blade is resiliently determined by the pressure used in shaving but the blade is not flexed itself during the shaving process.
Mullen and Stone are concerned with flexible handle means used with otherwise flexible razor blades.
Perry U.S. Pat. No. 3,587,171 and Simonetti are of general interest in disclosing blades that may be adjusted to a fixed flexed position for shaving but the blades do not flex during the shaving process itself.
The Cartwright et al disclosures purpose to shown a somewhat flexible blade and support for mounting the blade. They describe a thin razor blade having a width of about 1 1/2" and a length along a line perpendicular to the shaving edge that is substantially much less. The blade or a pair of blades are mounted in a flexible plastic holder that is adapted to be supported on a pair of parallel supporting bars carried on a conventional safety razor handle. The several Cartwright et al flexibly mounted blades are designed to bend in one direction only about "a 5 inch radius in response to normal human shaving forces", see col. 7 lines 30+in U.S. Pat. No. 4,409,725, which it is alleged, should make it conform to most of the contours encountered in the normal shaving process. The Cartwright et al blades are mounted to bend about only one axis that is perpendicular to the center point of the shaving edge of the blade.